Their praying to and even worshiping of various saints falls firmly into idolatry. Even going so far as to build statues, pendants, and other “holy” symbols and leaving offerings to them.
Catholics do not worship the saints. The dogma is that one may ask a saint to pray on their behalf. Do some Catholics not follow this format to the letter? Nope, some do not. Some/many will follow dogma mentally but use a short hand phrase like, “pray to X,” to mean requesting intercession.
The statues, pendants, and other ornaments are not idols but just works of art or symbols of allegiance to a specific order. They hold extra significance for some, but that is effectively as far as they go.
Offerings are to the church. Leaving an offering at the shrine of a saint is not an offering to that saint. It is an offering to the church, possibly to the portion of the church maintaining that specific shrine.
I know this can feel nit-picky, but it is what happens when teachings build upon teachings for thousands of years. One can certainly argue that Catholics are wrong about any number of things in this world, but the notion that Catholicism runs on idolatry is at best an accidental misinterpretation and unfortunately is often an intentional misrepresentation by the leaders of fellow Christians.
Their praying to and even worshiping of various saints falls firmly into idolatry. Even going so far as to build statues, pendants, and other “holy” symbols and leaving offerings to them.
Catholics do not worship the saints. The dogma is that one may ask a saint to pray on their behalf. Do some Catholics not follow this format to the letter? Nope, some do not. Some/many will follow dogma mentally but use a short hand phrase like, “pray to X,” to mean requesting intercession.
The statues, pendants, and other ornaments are not idols but just works of art or symbols of allegiance to a specific order. They hold extra significance for some, but that is effectively as far as they go.
Offerings are to the church. Leaving an offering at the shrine of a saint is not an offering to that saint. It is an offering to the church, possibly to the portion of the church maintaining that specific shrine.
I know this can feel nit-picky, but it is what happens when teachings build upon teachings for thousands of years. One can certainly argue that Catholics are wrong about any number of things in this world, but the notion that Catholicism runs on idolatry is at best an accidental misinterpretation and unfortunately is often an intentional misrepresentation by the leaders of fellow Christians.